degges



UNITED sTATEs PATENT oEEIoE,

WM. H. DEGGES, OF WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

SOAK-PIT 0F BRICK-MACHINES.

Specification of Letters Patent No. 12,997', dated June 5, 1855.

To all lwhom t may concern Be it known that I, WM. H. DEGGEs, ofVashington, in the District of Columbia, have invented a new and usefulImprovement in Soak-Pits for Brick-Machines, and do hereby declare thefollowing to be a full, clear, and exact description thereof, referencebeing had to the accompanying drawing, and to letters of referencemarked thereon, forming part of this specification, in which- Figure l,represents a plan of the soak pit with machinery for operating it. Fig.2 is a vertical section showing the manner of connecting it through theendless apron with a brick machine.

The same letters of reference occurring in both gures indicatecorresponding parts.

The nature of my invention consists in causing the soakpit of a brickmachine to revolve around its axis or center in such a manner that theclay is uniformly distributed and soaked, and conveyed to a convenientposition to be fed into the machine.

To enable others to make and use my invention I will describe it byreferring to the drawings.

The soak pit (A) is a shallow tub of large diameter supported onantifriction rollers (a) near its periphery and on balls or shot in anannular groove around its center, rising in the center even with orabove the sides of the tub is a tube (c), encompassing a cylindricalcolumn (f) which forms the center or axis around which the tub revolves;its revolution is produced by a screw or worm wheel (d) gearing intoteeth or cogs around the tub at or near the bottom; the shaft of thescrew (d) is geared and operated in any convenient manner from the crankshaft of the steam engine; the hanger frame (e) is attached to thecolumn (f) by bands or journal boxes above the tube (c) and furnishesbearings for the drum (g) around which the endless apron (h) passes toconvey the clay to the brick machine, also for the rotary screen (i) fordusting the apron.

The soak pit is put in motion around its center by the screw (d) whichis so geared as to cause it to make but one revolution in a day whenused in connection with a single press, its capacity being equal to adays consumption if intended to supply two or more presses its diametershould be increased in proportion and its speed relatively diminished.The clay which has been previously pulverized and soaked in the pit isshoveled onto the endless apron, the pit being in motion keeps the edgeof the clay bank therein all the time at the same distance from theendless apron, so that the hands supplying the machine need never changetheir position; a pulverizer situated over the opposite side ofthe tub,or on the other side of the apron is at the same time supplying clay atthe rear end of the clay bank in the soakpit for the next daysconsumption; thus affording uniformly twentyfour hours for everyparticle of clay to soak before it goes into the press, and beinggradually fed up to the side of the endless apron enables about half thenumber of hands to supply the machine with the same amount of material.

What I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is Therevolving soak pit or its equivalent for uniformly soaking the clay whenpulverized and conveying it to a convenient position to be fed into thebrick machine substantially as specified.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto subscribed my name this 19th dayof May 1855.

W. H. DEGGES.

